What does 'self-esteem' mean?

Post Reply New Topic

So many people.... and especially, so many counselors, tell me about raising my self-esteem.

I'm very confused by this concept of 'self-esteem'. What does it mean?

To me, I feel 'good' when I am able to help others. When I am needed, and when I come through for someone. The more difficult problem I solve for that person, the better I feel about myself.

But when I am by myself, and no one has asked me for any help, I don't feel any particular way about myself. Not good, and not bad, and not so-so; I just feel nothing whatsoever.

I wonder, how can there even be such a thing as self-esteem? I believe I'm aware of all my strengths and weaknesses so far.

How to translate these strengths and weaknesses to self-esteem? Obviously I esteem myself badly at, say, electronics, because I don't know anything about it. At the same time, I esteem myself very highly as a naturalist, because if I take someone through these local forests and mountains, I can tell them everything about the geology, ecology, all the local flora and fauna, and even the evolution of all of these things.

What to do? Assign a numerical grade to everything I think I'm good/bad at and come up with an average number indicating my overall self-esteem? But averages don't really mean much.

I'm aware that self-esteem seems to be a very basic and important quality to the majority of people.

So how can you measure your own self-esteem? And how can you get better at it, short of shifting the number of things you're good at versus what you're not good at?

Or..... am I not seeing the forest for the trees (which is likely)? Am I being too logical?

How do you measure your own self-esteem? What makes it better, or worse?

Self-esteem is your emotional assessment of your worth as a person. Given the length of the wikipedia page on self-esteem it's probably more complicated than that but it's roughly what it's about. What's important is that it's a feeling, not a logical deduction or calculation.

Self-esteem is raised by feeling that you're good at something or that you're being, for lack of a better word, chivalrous. The opposite lowers self-esteem. Because it's emotional it has a lot to do with mentality and little with actual results.

Also, people expect the overall self-esteem of most people is positive, just like when they ask how you're doing they expect "good" and not "average" as an answer.

[quote="MollyTroubletail"]
But when I am by myself, and no one has asked me for any help, I don't feel any particular way about myself. Not good, and not bad, and not so-so; I just feel nothing whatsoever. [/]

^What you say here could indicate your self-esteem level, but have you tried thinking at it in a different way? Self-esteem is how worthwhile you percieve yourself to be as a person, so, do you percieve yourself to be worthwhile as a person? If you have low self-esteem, you might believe that you don't deserve other people's kindness or generosity, that you don't deserve to have people 'waste' their time helping you out. You might also think that you are no good at things, when, in fact, you are very good at some things. If you have average self-esteem, you believe that you are a reasonably worthwile person, that sometimes it's okay for people to help you or compliment you, if that's what they want to do/think. You might also feel that, though you are good at some things and not so good at others, the good things help balance out the bad, and leave you feeling relatively useful and worthwhile.

In your case, you appear to accept the fact that you are a good naturalist. If somebody complemented you on that, would you believe them and say 'Thankyou, I suppose I am.', or would you think they were 'just being nice, they can't mean it' and say 'No i'm not, i'm rubbish, there are so many other people who are better than me.'. If you fall into the latter category, this may indicate low self-esteem, if you fall into the former, it could indicate a more reasonable level of self-esteem.

I'm not sure, but I think that, to have a reasonably high level of self-esteem, you have to understand that you have both strengths and weaknesses, but that you are still worthwhile, and that your weaknesses do not make you 'stupid', 'useless' or a 'bad person'.



[quote="MollyTroubletail"] How to translate these strengths and weaknesses to self-esteem? Obviously I esteem myself badly at, say, electronics, because I don't know anything about it. At the same time, I esteem myself very highly as a naturalist, because if I take someone through these local forests and mountains, I can tell them everything about the geology, ecology, all the local flora and fauna, and even the evolution of all of these things. [/]

^This paragraph seems to more adequately describe self-efficacy. Like self-esteem, self-efficacy is one of several things that make up an idea called the self-concept. When you describe your strengths and weaknesses in an accurate, impersonal way, just stating the facts, without allowing your level of skill at these things to affect how you feel about yourself as a person, you are using self-efficacy. For example, you were using self-efficacy when you said 'I esteem myself badly at, say, electronics' as long as you don't feel bad about not being good with electronics, or blame yourself for it, you just accept that there are some things you are naturally good at, and some things you are not.

Um, I hope I got all of this right, and it wasn't too hard to understand. I do tend to go on a bit, and sometimes I don't actually know what i'm talking about. This is just what I learned studying psychology.

I think self-esteem is just;
If you think you are better than others you have high self-esteem
If you think you are on the same level with others you have good self-esteem
If you think you are worse than others you have low self-esteem

It doesn't need to be some feeling you have on all the time, just how you view your abilities and worth as a person.
It is painfully obvious to myself that I hate myself, which means I have low self-esteem.

Put simply, self esteem is this: If you met yourself, would you like you? We all have certain ideas on what a person should be, what qualities they should carry or at least try to. Not having those qualities ourselves gives you a low self esteem, just like you'd think less of another person who didn't have them. You often see people with low self esteem to have very high or unrealistic views of what the standards are and simply assume they're incapable of reaching them, so giving them 'Self-Esteem' usually means separating truth from B.S as far as what's realistic and/or expected. Self-improvement plays a part, too, but that also has to be tempered with realism, especially in regards to things like physical appearance and finances.

TL;DR version: We're the worst judges of ourselves and beat ourselves up over stupid things that can't be helped or don't matter.

I assume self esteem means how you feel about yourself. Like low self esteem would mean someone is hard on themselves and thinks badly of themselves and always puts themselves down. they are not happy with who they are and not happy about their life. Looking it up just now, I am apparently right what it means.

I think you can have high self esteem in some things and have low self esteem in others. Some people are both depending on what it comes to.

How great you see yourself I guess you can say, or a sense of self worth.

Self-esteem means in a nutshell: have you accepted yourself for who you are? And also, have you come to terms with life as it should be, not simply how it is?

This is not an easy thing to do when you are trying to do your best and underachieve! It's a noble human thing to want the best that life can offer, and to try to meet that challenge. We don't always succeed - I hold on to the view I found in "Man of La Mancha", the story of Miguel de Cervantes:

"I have lived for over forty years and I have seen life as it is: pain, misery, cruelty beyond belief - I've heard all the voices of God's noblest creature. Moans from bundles of filth in the street. I've been a soldier and a slave. I've seen my comrades fall in battle, or under the lash in Africa; I've held them at the last moment of their lives. These were men who saw life as it is. But they died despairing. No glory, no brave last words, and in their eyes filled with confusion, questioning why? I do not think they were asking why they were dying, but why they had ever lived. When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical is madness; to surrender dreams, this may be madness; to seek treasure where there is only trash - too much sanity may be madness! But maddest of all, to see life as it IS, and not as it SHOULD BE".

Just to address the point, if you can hold on to your dreams when you have under-achieved, your self-esteem will be high! Probably no-one gets 10/10, but maybe 7 or 8; if you get less then the self-esteem count will be lower. It's what you make it, this life, and to beat yourself up for things you can't control is like Basil Fawlty whipping a mini with a tree when it breaks down (seen the sketch?)

Sense of agency. Knowing how and why you feel good to be alive with some respect towards the "unknown".
People deem other people more estimable when respect is easily exchangeable. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses and pointing that out to too many people tends to bite back. In a social setting concentrating on your's and other's strengths tends to allow you to establish a position in the local hierarchy. This then allows one to develop a form of a broader societal self esteem, for better or for worse (that depends on if you actually require or desire one).
True friends are not afraid to talk about their strengths and weaknesses and help each other out. They're a treasure, so try to keep them for life.
In the end just know you're alive and take joy from that. Learn to appreciate beauty in all it's forms. Work on both your strengths and weaknesses and don't let any ignorant fools tell you how to feel about yourself.

I think I'm better at some things than some people and worse at some things than others. I don't think anyone is not worthwhile, so I couldn't score myself against them. I don't really know exactly what other people do all the time so I can't really compare myself. I frustrate myself a lot and have been told I have low self esteem, so maybe I do.